


Don't cry!

by inu (inuverse)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, First Kiss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-11
Updated: 2017-11-11
Packaged: 2019-02-01 00:02:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12692889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inuverse/pseuds/inu
Summary: If the path you have chosen leads you to a point where you think you can‘t go on, hope and love will be the only things that can make you perserve and fulfill your task. (HG/SS)





	Don't cry!

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [Weine nicht!](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12642786) by [inuverse](https://archiveofourown.org/users/inuverse/pseuds/inuverse). 



Severus Snape stood in front of the fireplace in his office. A glass of whiskey in his hand. He tightened his fingers around the glass, staring into the flames. The only source of light in this blackest of nights. He was alone. The headmaster had left long ago. Severus had taken care of the curse one last time. And everything had been said, what had to be said. It had been decided, then. Their fate. The end. At last.  
A soft sound in the dark. The door to his rooms. He did not turn around but closed his eyes. His forehead was wrinkled. He was composing himself. As if he had expected this moment, as one would expect pain after being wounded.  
A small person stood in the room in the darkness. The hood of her robes was hiding her face. She waited motionless. When he did not react, she finally pulled the cloak from her heavy, dark curls, exposing the view on her young, pale features. Warm, brown eyes that reflected the fire from the fireplace and the silhouette of the man standing in front of it. Then he looked at her.  
An unspoken question appeared on the face of the young woman. Then her pupils widened in silent realization.  
"It's time, isn‘t it?" She said hoarsely.  
He looked away again. Back into the fire, which seemed to burn in his eyes. A burning, which continued and scorched the mask from his features. He ran a hand over his face, as if he could make the tortured expression disapear by doing so - the fear, the anger, the pain, the despair, the helplessness. Without success.  
She still stood in the middle of the room. He turned his head to her. Slowly. Until his eyes met hers. He cleared his throat, but his voice sounded strained as he began to speak:  
"It has only been a matter of time. You knew that. "  
She sucked in breathe with a hissing sound. Then she pressed her jaws tightly together, as if she could control her features like that. Prevent herself, her whole person, from falling apart. She wanted to say something, but he was faster:  
"Nothing you want to say now will change a thing." He sounded tired.  
Her hands involuntarily clawed at her robes.  
"You are strong," he said. "You will make your own way."  
Tears were welling in her eyes. He turned back, turning his gaze away from her to the dancing flames, waiting for the sound of fading footsteps, the soft click of the door into the lock, and the cold silence that would follow. Because everything had been said now. He closed his eyes.  
The sudden weight of a hand on his back between his shoulder blades made him flinch in surprise. Warmth. A whisper.  
"Don‘t you want to kiss me at least just once?"  
The glass fell from his hand. Crashed onto the floor. It broke into a thousand pieces. Whiskey and sharp shards of glass. He turned around. His gaze fixed on her hand, which now lay on his chest. Directly over his heart that was beating faster with each long, eternal second that they were frozen in place. He stared and swallowed hard.  
"Promise me something!" He demanded in a harsh whisper and looked straight into her eyes.  
"Everything!"  
"Don‘t cry!"  
She held his gaze and took a deep breathe.  
"I will not cry, but I'll wait for you," she said firmly, "no war will last forever."  
He smiled bleakly.  
"Do not waste your time, girl."  
His gaze moved back to her hand on his chest, then back to her face, what eventually made her take her hand down and away, as if to acknowledge her defeat.  
She knew that he had principles. Principles that made her, being his student, into something untouchable. It was the line that kept what was wrong and right, good and bad, black and white sharply separated. She was indeed strong and she was a Gryffindor, brave or rather stupid enough to challenge him. Law wise she was no longer a child but an adult woman and soon he would no longer be her teacher but as Dumbledore's murderer on the run. Wrong, right, good, bad, black, white ... gray.  
He took her face in his hands. Her eyes widened in surprise and then he kissed her. For the first and only time.  
It wasn‘t a kiss full of pent-up passion or desperate desire. It wasn‘t a hopeful promise of a better future - any kind of future - for none of them knew anyway, whether or not they would be able to keep such a promise with war ahead. It was a kiss full of simple regret and grief for what they could have been or would have been able to become at another time, place, life. It was a farewell.  
"Goodbye, Miss Granger!"  
That night Hermione did not cry and neither did she cry in the days and nights that followed ever after.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own Harry Potter and the Potter-verse (unfortunately) nor 'Don't Cry' by Guns'n'Roses. I don't make money of Fanfiction. No copyright or trademark right infringement is intended by this fic.
> 
> This fic was inspired by the Guns'n' Roses' song 'Don't Cry'


End file.
